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Archive - April 2002

APIA, Samoa (April 24, 2002 - Samoa Observer/PINA Nius Online)---Samoa Polytechnic is developing a unique pilot program that it expects to form the basis for small business studies via correspondence in the Pacific.

At a conference in Wellington, senior business lecturer Tertia Stunzner-Ryan presented a paper detailing the pilot program entitled: "Adapting an Open Learning Package on Small Business for the Needs of Samoa."

The pilot program is a response to a joint initiative of the Commonwealth of Learning and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

The goal is to prepare a small business instructional package that will target individual communities by reflecting their specific needs.

PORT MORESBY, Papua New Guinea (April 23, 2002 - The National/PINA Nius Online)---Cathy Kakaraya is a Papua New Guinea woman with a mission. She wants to be the first woman Governor of Enga and the Highlands region.

Many would say she was molded by her father, former Wapenamanda MP Sir Pato Kakaraya, to be part of a game that very few women dare to play, especially in Papua New Guinea.

She's also married to one of the country's rising political leaders – United Resources Party leader and dismissed Southern Highlands Governor Anderson Agiru.

Ms. Kakaraya is among 100 women running in the June election and is adamant that women are the best managers in the world and would manage the country better than men.

She is one of 13 candidates (the other 12 are men, including incumbent Peter Ipatas) contesting the Enga Regional seat.

She tried in 1997 and came in a distant 13 in a field of 19. But she said this was just a learning...

AVARUA, Rarotonga, Cook Islands (April 24, 2002 – Cook Islands Star/Auckland)---Maybe it’s just Atiu. But there are growing fears that Coalition 6 is planning to win the next general elections the old fashioned way: buying votes.

Specifically, jobs for votes.

"Everyone seems to be waiting for a government job," says former Atiu mayor Roger Malcolm.

Pressed for details, Malcolm says he has seriously approached five people about work he needs done only to be met with the same response: "They’re not really interested. Some actually said they are waiting for Charles."

Charlie Koronui is Island Secretary on Atiu. He’s also president of the New Alliance Party, headed by Atiu MP Norman George, a politician who has moved his balance of power four times since general elections in 1999 to get what he wants.

George claims progress in the outer islands is his main priority. Others, fairly or not, see this irrepressible MP as doing...

JAKARTA, Indonesia (April 25, 2002 – The Jakarta Post/Kabar-Irian)---The Army’s Special Force (Kopassus) has named Hotma Sitompul as the lawyer for three of its members now under investigation in connection with the killing of Papuan pro-independence leader Theys Hiyo Eluay.

Hotma told The Jakarta Post he began to provide legal advice for the Kopassus officers on Wednesday. He said he met with the officers at the Military Police detention center in the Gambir area of central Jakarta.

The three men have been detained since April 10, pending completion of the investigation. The Military Police have not yet named them as suspects in the case.

Theys was found dead a day after he attended the Heroes Day celebration at the Kopassus' Tribuana Task Force Headquarters in Jayapura on Nov. 11 last year.

The government-sanctioned inquiry into the case has completed its task and is waiting for the President to summon the team to present its...

MAJURO, Marshall Islands (April 19, 2002 – The Marshall Islands Journal)---The rapidly deteriorating condition of the College of the Marshall Islands (CMI) facilities at its Gugeegue Island campus has forced the Board of Regents to temporarily suspend all academic programs for the coming year.

As soon as classes end next month, CMI will halt classes at the Kwajalein campus until August 2003, according to a board decision reached on Monday.

"We recognize that the suspension of all our Gugeegue-based academic programs will represent a real hardship for the many students who have come to rely on us there," said Interim President John Tuthill.

"We are already working on a number of plans to accommodate as many Gugeegue students as possible on the Majuro campus, and to provide other education opportunities for those who have to remain on Kwajalein."

Motivating the CMI board’s decision to close the Gugeegue campus for one year is the fact that it is "not...

NOUMÉA, New Caledonia (April 24, 2002 – Radio Australia)---A spokesman for New Caledonia's pro-independence coalition, the FLNKS, has expressed disappointment at the surprise defeat of socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin in the first round of the French presidential election.

The FLNKS had urged its supporters to vote for Mr. Jospin in order to ensure continuity of the implementation of the Nouméa Accord.

The accord, which sets a timetable for the decolonization of New Caledonia, was brokered and signed under French socialist governments.

FLNKS spokesman Victor Tutugoro told Radio Australia's Pacific Beat program that the decolonization process was only meaningful if all the conditions of the Nouméa Accord were implemented.

With incumbent President Jacques Chirac expected to be returned, Mr. Tutugoro said the pro-independence coalition feared one crucial provision of the Accord might not go ahead.

PORT MORESBY, Papua New Guinea (April 24, 2002 – Post-Courier)---Eight more children have died of measles in Mt. Hagen.

The deaths last week now bring the measles outbreak death toll to 46 since January.

Parents of current patients at the pediatric ward have seen more than enough deaths and are hoping for a different and positive outcome for their children.

Mourning has becoming a common thing as hospital staff, ill equipped with insufficient drugs, try to combat what many parents describe as a "losing battle" against the outbreak.

The drastic shortage of vital drugs and intravenous fluids along with the large number of patients arriving daily has caused the hospital to discharge many patients still infected with the measles virus.

This has caused other children of victims discharged to be affected and admitted.

Some parents, who have only left the hospital, return again with a different child or the same one.

JAYAPURA, Papua, Indonesia (April 25, 2002 - The Jakarta Post)---The Papua police plan to launch raids on houses belonging to suspected rebels in the regency of Manokwari to search for three firearms and hundreds of rounds of ammunition that were seized from local security forces last year.

The operation will be undertaken by a team of anti-terrorist police later this month in Wasior sub-district, Deputy Papua Police chief Brig. Gen. Raziman Tarigan said here on Tuesday.

He declined to specify the date.

The three weapons were part of a haul of six SS-1 rifles that members of the separatist Free Papua Organization (OPM) seized during an attack on the Wasior police station in May, 2001, which resulted in the deaths of five Mobile Brigade (Brimob) personnel.

The attackers surrendered three of the weapons on Dec. 27, 2001, after intensive negotiations in which the authorities agreed to accept the rebels' demand for their three unnamed...

PORT MORESBY, Papua New Guinea (April 24, 2002 – Post-Courier)---The Pan Melanesian Congress (PMC) aims to achieve full political, economic and social integration of the Melanesian nations by the year 2025, if voted into government.

PMC president Ben Micah hopes for a Melanesian Federation following the European Union model, with a common currency, a Melanesian Parliament and common policies on environment protection, resource development, foreign affairs, security and defense.

Mr. Micah is re-contesting his former Kavieng Open seat lost to Ian Ling Stuckey in 1997.

Pacific Islands Report is a nonprofit news publication of the Pacific Islands Development Program at the East-West Center in Honolulu, Hawai‘i. Offered as a free service to readers, PIR provides an edited digest of news, commentary and analysis from across the Pacific Islands region, Monday - Friday.